


Like the Wolf on the Fold

by BuggreAlleThis



Category: Christian Bible (Old Testament), Good Omens (TV), Jewish Scripture & Legend
Genre: Angst, Assyria, Corporal Punishment, Crowley's Rat Army, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Flogging, Gen, Jerusalem, Pre-Arrangement (Good Omens), Pre-Slash, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-07
Updated: 2020-01-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:40:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22163458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BuggreAlleThis/pseuds/BuggreAlleThis
Summary: 701 BCE. The Assyrian king Sennacherib has torn through the Levant on his way to Egypt. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers have besieged Jerusalem. King Hezekiah prays to God for deliverance, and Heaven answers in the form of an angel.Aziraphale just has an incredibly shit couple of days. Pure angst.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 67
Kudos: 232
Collections: Hurt Aziraphale





	Like the Wolf on the Fold

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry to everyone who has left a comment which I have yet to reply to; I am still officially on hiatus, but I had to get this one out because it would not leave me alone, and I have so much work to do! Thank you to everyone, and I will reply as soon as I am able to!

To the south-west of Jerusalem, on the road between the city and the Fuller’s Field, stood three men: the Tartan, the field-marshall of the Assyrian army; the Rabsaris, the chief of government officials; and the Rabshakeh, the chief of princes, the cup-bearer, vizier, and friend of Sennacherib, the great king, the mighty king, king of the Universe, king of the four quarters, viceroy of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad, favourite of the great gods, perfect hero, first among all princes, the powerful one who consumes those who refuse to submit, who destroys the wicked with thunderbolts, king of Assyria.

Coming to meet them were three more men. The first was Eliakim, son of Hilkiah, who was the chief official of the palace. The second was Shebnah, the treasurer and chancellor. The third was a pale-skinned man, with hair like the wool of a sheep and eyes the colour of the sea, who wore a long tunic of bleached linen tied at the neck with golden beads, and who carried an inlaid writing case. This was the symbol and tool of his office, being the _mazkir_ , the remembrancer, and everyone in Jerusalem knew him as Joah, son of Asaph.

They met the Assyrians beneath the city walls, which bristled with the spears of newly appointed and hastily trained soldiers.

“I have the reply,” said the Rabshakeh in Hebrew. “His message for your king Hezekiah: ‘Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: On what do you base this confidence of yours?Do you think that mere words are strategy and power for war? On whom do you now rely, that you have rebelled against me? See, you’re relying now on Egypt, that broken reed of a staff, which will pierce the hand of anyone who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to all who rely on him.”

Privately, Aziraphale agreed. Shabaka was useless and arrogant; either trait was bad, but both together were fatal. He’d confiscated all the lands belonging to the professional warriors for himself, and so contributed not only to the Assyrian army, but ensured that half of Northern Africa was covered in bands of mercenaries and robbers. But Egypt was still the richest country in the world, and Israel and Judah had the misfortune of standing right in between Sennacherib and his Egyptian prey.

The Rabshakeh held up his hand to waylay Eliakim’s interruption. “But if you say to me, ‘We rely on our God Yahweh,’” he continued, with malice in his eyes; Aziraphale suddenly realised that this man was probably the descendent of Judeans captured decades before, “isn’t he the god whose high places and altars Hezekiah got rid of? Didn’t he say to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You must only worship before this altar in Jerusalem’?” He grinned. “Well?”

“Your spies are well informed,” said Shebnah.

“No spies. We don’t need them. We’ve taken every city we’ve besieged.” The Rabshakeh raised his eyebrows. “I’ll tell you what, make a wager with my master the king of Assyria: I'll give you two thousand horses, if you have enough riders for them.”

The other two Assyrians laughed. Shebnah’s hands were in fists at his sides. Aziraphale didn’t look up from his writing.

“No? Can’t manage that? Then how are you going to see off a single captain among the least of my master’s servants, when you rely on Egypt for chariots _and_ for horsemen? Wait, wait, there’s more: ‘Moreover, is it without Yahweh that I have come up against this place to destroy it? _Yahweh_ said to _me_ , Go up against this land, and destroy it.’”

This blasphemy was too much. Aziraphale finished his sentence quickly, and looked up at the Assyrians. “Rabshakeh, I really must compliment you on your Hebrew. It’s ever so kind of you to- to deliver this message from your king in our language, but there’s no need. We’re all educated men. We all speak Aramaic. Please don’t put yourself to any bother.”

The Rabshakeh laughed. “Oh, kind of us, is it? It’s no bother. I’m _delighted_ to be able to speak your backwards tongue, because my king’s message isn’t just for you. It’s for _everyone_.” He turned around towards the city, cupped his hands around his mouth, and shouted in Hebrew, “It’s also a message for the people sitting on the wall, who are doomed to eat their own shit and drink their own piss!” He glanced at Aziraphale and grinned. “Just like you.”

“Well done,” Shebnah murmured.

“Hear the message of the great king, the king of Assyria! Thus says the king: ‘Don’t let Hezekiah deceive you, because he's not going to be able to save you from me!Don’t let Hezekiah make you rely on Yahweh by saying, ‘Yahweh will save us! This city won’t be given into the hand of the king of Assyria!’ Don’t listen to Hezekiah; for thus says the king of Assyria: ‘Make your peace with me and come out to me! Then every one of you will eat from your own vine and your own fig tree, and drink water from your own cistern, until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive oil and honey. Choose to live instead of die! Don’t listen to Hezekiah when he misleads you by saying, Yahweh will deliver us. Has any of the gods of the nations ever delivered its land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand? Who among all the gods of the countries have delivered their countries out of my hand, that _Yahweh_ should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?’”

He was answered by a stony silence, and the Rabshakeh turned back to the three emissaries. “See? My Hebrew’s just fine.”

*

They reported to Hezekiah. Hezekiah sent them to the prophet to see what God had to say on the matter.

Isaiah was ancient by this point, approaching ninety, and his white beard was so long that he tucked it into his belt. As the small band approached he stroked it with a trembling hand.

Eliakim, Shebnah, and the priests all greeted the prophet with kisses. When it was Aziraphale’s turn to do so, Isaiah studied his face with sparkling eyes.

“Ah. Aha. And what’s your name?”

“Joah. Son of Asaph.”

“I see. I see. My hearing’s not what it was; whisper in my ear, your name.”

Aziraphale smiled despite himself, and leant forward. “Aziraphale,” he whispered.

“Joah.” Isaiah gave him a wink. “Joah. Very nice to see you again, my boy. I remember now. And you’re writing everything down, are you? Very good. Excellent. Well. There’s no need to worry.”

Unfortunately, by the time they had returned to Jerusalem, Hezekiah had received another volley of threats from Sennacherib and ensconced himself in the Holy of Holies, wearing sackcloth and weeping. One of Isaiah’s sons turned up with a memorised message, which Aziraphale dutifully copied out. Very nice, he thought, very poetic, but it ended with a promise: _He shall not come into this city, shoot an arrow there, come before it with a shield, or cast up a siege ramp against it. By the way that he came, he shall return; he shall not come into this city. For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David._

Aziraphale went into the Temple to deliver the tablet; he could slide it under the curtain if there were any human witnesses. Eliakim and Shebnah weren’t leaving his side, for one thing.

As they approached the Holy of Holies, Aziraphale felt the unmistakable shift in the air and heard the unmistakable chime. He turned to his right, looking around the inner courtyard until he saw Gabriel, standing up on the highest wall. Obviously. He wore a long robe of the finest linen, as white as lightning, a necklace of gold and lapis lazuli and carnelian, and at his side he carried a tablet of carved ivory and beeswax – a far finer example of Aziraphale’s own tools.

Aziraphale sighed, and unlooped his writing case from around his neck. “There’s something I have to do. Please, give this to the king.”

The priests filed past them. Eliakim and Shebnah stared at him, the former in surprise, the second in growing outrage. “You need to read the prophet’s words to the king…” said Shebnah.

“You can read. There’s something I’ve got to see to. I’ll hopefully see you later.”

Shebnah’s eyes were hard. “More important than the words of the prophet? More important than the King?” He rolled his eyes. “If you’re going to try to make a run for it, you could at least think up a decent lie, Joah.”

Aziraphale waited until Eliakim and Shebnah were out of sight, and sighed. Well, there was another job gone. He trotted across the courtyard and took the stairs two at a time. “Sorry, just had to-“

“Hi there, Aziraphale,” Gabriel said. He smiled – a twisting, close-mouthed thing. “Good news: the Lord’s listened to Hezekiah. Jerusalem won’t be taken.”

“Oh!” Aziraphale’s shoulders relaxed, and he beamed. “Oh, really? Oh, that’s wonderful – that’s wonderful news! Oh, I’m so relieved. You know, we just came back from the prophet, and he said-“

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Gabriel said. “So, don’t panic. All good!”

Aziraphale smiled, and looked out over the vast Assyrian army. The pennants fluttered in the breeze; the horses decked in their caparisons of red and gold snorted and ate; the noonday sun scattered glitter across the masses of bronze armour. “Do you know what it’s to be?”

“Nope, that’s completely up to you,” Gabriel said.

Aziraphale froze, and slowly turned his head to stare up at Gabriel. “ _Me_?”

“Yes, Aziraphale, you. Duh. You’re the agent on the ground, aren’t you?”

“But- I don’t have the power to turn back an entire army!” Aziraphale said. “Perhaps… Sennacherib’s at Lachish, I can fly there now, try to persuade him-"

“No,” Gabriel said. The was an edge of thunder to his voice. “No, no messing around. Your order is to destroy the army. Total annihilation.”

Aziraphale looked over the Assyrian army. He couldn't see its end. “But I- I can’t-I never killed anyone before! There’s so many of them!”

“One hundred and eighty-five thousand, by our count. Not including all the usual whores and opportunists, you can do what you think best with them. But the soldiers need to go.”

“If they could be turned back…?” Aziraphale said hopefully.

“No. For God’s sake, Aziraphale…” Gabriel placed his hands on Aziraphale’s shoulders, and they were _heavy_ – not metaphorically, but genuinely heavy, like weights of iron. It took all of Aziraphale’s strength to stop his knees from buckling.

“This is a direct order, you hear?” Gabriel said. His eyes bored into Aziraphale’s. “Kill. Every. Single. Assyrian. Soldier. You got that, sport? Kill them all. We don’t care how you do it, but they’ve all got to be dead by sunrise tomorrow. We’re going to answer Hezekiah’s prayer.” Gabriel suddenly grinned, and his teeth were as white as his linen robe. “You’re going to save Jerusalem!”

“Hurrah,” Aziraphale whispered. There was something poisonous and writhing in his stomach, thick and surging up his throat-

“Oh, you might want to use your flaming sword,” Gabriel said. The grin was still on his face, and his eyes were like the evening sky. “I’m remembering right, aren’t I? You were issued with a flaming sword?”

Aziraphale nodded helplessly.

“Great. You still have that? Not lost it?”

Aziraphale shook his head. Something cold ran down his back, and flies or bees were buzzing around his ears…

“Fantastic.” Gabriel clapped Aziraphale’s shoulder, and Aziraphale unthinkingly brought up his hands to shield his face. “You’ll do great, buddy. I’ll let you get to it – you’ve got a lot of work to do!”

Aziraphale stared at the city as Gabriel ascended. As soon as he felt the archangel leave the material plane his legs gave out beneath him, and he tumbled heavily onto the stones.

In the first rank of campfires, two soldiers were tossing a ball to each other. Someone was marking the score on the ground. Behind him he could feel the radiating terror of the people of Jerusalem: the women sick with fear, trying to distract their children; the priests offering a stream of sacrifices to God.

He didn’t vomit, though he wanted to. Nor did he cry. He just sat, and stared.

*

“Pay up, Nirari,” Crawly said, and took the hunk of bread. “Thank you! Anyone here thinks they can do what Nirari couldn’t? One game of dal, double or nothing! Tukulti?”

Tukulti lifted the fringed hem of his short tunic in response, and Crawly laughed. “Fair enough.”

There were nerves, sure, but the mood in the Assyrian camp was upbeat. Jerusalem would be a piece of piss; the army was only so large because once Hezekiah surrendered _again_ they’d go on towards Egypt and the real fight would begin.

So it was understandable, that there’d be fear on the air. But as the afternoon drew on, and the sky turned red and pink and orange, Crawly began to realise that the despair wasn’t human despair. It was not a despair of immediate fear – it had the feeling of an old tower, crumbling, inevitably about to fall… Immortal despair, not mortal.

If there was another immortal around, perhaps it was…

It didn’t take long to find the angel, once Crawly had recognised another immortal presence in the vicinity. He found him by the Siloam pool, knees to his chest, left arm hugging them close. His right was wrapped up and over his head, like a wing to shield himself from rain.

There was no rain; the Eastern sky was pierced by a hundred stars already, glimmering into being between fat clouds. The angel was so wrapped in misery he didn’t feel Crawly approach, and Crawly had the rare opportunity to look without being seen.

Aziraphale was rocking back and forth. Just a little. Just enough that Crawly, with a snake’s sense for such things, found himself mirroring the movement. And with his right hand, he was gently stroking his own hair.

“Ngk,” said Crawly, quite involuntarily. He felt like a spear had passed right through him, all five cubits of one. Aziraphale looked up, and Crawly gave him a manic grin and a waved. “Aziraphale! Fancy seeing you here!”

“Oh.” Aziraphale stopped the _stroking_ , thank Satan, but he remained curled in on himself. That was a bad sign. “Hullo, Crawly.”

“Hey.” Crawly sat down next to the pool, and slid his feet in. “Ah. Cheer up, angel. It may never happen.”

“It won’t. God’s going to answer Hezekiah’s prayer.”

“Oh?” Crawly splashed his feet back and forth, frowning. “I’d think you’d be happy about that…”

“She wants the whole Assyrian army dead.”

“The whole- The _whole_ army?”

“All one hundred and eighty-five thousand. Yes.”

“Fuck. All of…” Crawly shouldn’t be surprised, he thought. This was the same God who’d sent the Flood, after all. “How? Rain? Fire and brimstone?”

Aziraphale’s mouth was twisting. His chin wobbled. “Me.”

Crawly couldn’t help it. He laughed.

*

The setting sun sent long shadows stretching and skittering across the land. The campfires grew brighter in the falling gloom, thousands and thousands of angry, winking stars.

Crawly wet his scarf in the pool of Siloam again, and pressed it against his eye socket. “I _said_ I’m sorry.”

Aziraphale swiped at his face, and healed Crawly’s black eye with a wave of his hand. “I’m not going to,” he said, with a sidelong glance. “Say sorry. I. I’ll do far worse before- before-"

“Urgh, don’t _cry_ ,” Crawly said, blinking and prodding his healed eye. “Would it help to say I deserved it? Like them? If they win, you know what they’ll do. Sennacherib doesn’t play around. He calls _himself_ ‘Terror of Nations’. He’s proud of it.”

“I know.”

“Do you know what he’s done in Lachish? The people, they get raped and carted off into slavery, if they’re lucky. The officials on the other hand, like you and all your mates in the palace, they’ve all been staked to the ground and skinned. That or impaled alive.”

“That’s him, though! Sennacherib! Not the soldiers!”

“Nope, it very much _is_ the soldiers. Soldiers stripping people and building handy little… impalement gallows. Shoving living people down onto the stakes. Peeling their skin off.”

“Not all of them!"

“Do I need to remind you who their chief god is? The clue’s in the name. Ashur. Getting one over on him, especially to save everyone in Jerusalem – massive! Massive feather in your wing!”

“But to _kill_ them all- No matter how evil they are, I can’t kill them, I can’t kill so many of them-“

“Yeah. Exactly. So many of them swarming through Jerusalem. So many of them looting that lovely Temple you’re so proud of.”

“Are you trying to _tempt me_?”

“No, you stupid bloody idiot!” Crawly shouted back. “I’m trying to _comfort_ you!”

“Well, don’t!” Aziraphale sniffed wretchedly and hugged his knees again. “I should… I know I need to start. I’ve been ordered to kill them all by sunrise.”

“I don’t know how much fire and brimstone you’ve got in you, but… but you probably won’t even see them,” Crawly said, in a last-ditch attempt to cheer the angel up. He knew Aziraphale would hear them, though. Would smell them. “It’ll get monotonous. You won’t feel anything after the first hour…”

Aziraphale buried his face in his arms and wept again, and Crawly felt fury rising in him until he could have destroyed the whole army with hellfire himself. It was _unfair_. It was _stupid_. God had precisely one angel who was decent, who was _kind_ , who'd worked hard to preserve some measure of innocence on this bewildering, mesmerising planet, and that just couldn’t be allowed to stand, no, Heaven had to turn its last gentle soul into a mass murderer. As though they didn’t have enough of them going spare.

He stood up. “Okay. God wants the siege to fail, right? Jerusalem and its king and all its inhabitants fine and dandy. We can do that.”

Aziraphale looked up at him. The redness around his eyes made them look like sea-glass, even in the twilight. “What?”

“There’s a lot of them, but between us we can just… We’ll make them ill. We won’t actually let them shit themselves to death, but if it looks messy the officers won’t have any choice but to call it off. We’ll sabotage them! All their weapons. We can take out the machines. Wood-rot everywhere, all the spears splintering.”

Aziraphale was goggling at him. “You’d help?”

“Not _help_! Fuck off. I’ll cause mischief and anger. I’ll spread chaos. And you won’t breathe a word of it to anyone!”

Aziraphale shook his head. “I won’t! Oh, _Crawly_ , that’s so-“

Crawly punched Aziraphale in the chest to waylay the inevitable ‘compliment’. Tit for tat.

*

“All right, men!” Crawly said. Behind him, Aziraphale perched on a large boulder, rubbing his sternum. Before him, every mouse and rat in the city was gathered, chattering nervously. “All right – thank you! Before anything else, thank you for answering the summons! I have a deal to put to you.”

Crawley’s skin began to darken, turning scaly, blood-red and night-black – the same colours as the black sky with its red clouds, their bellies lit by the Assyrian campfires. “The deal is this: do what I say tonight, and tomorrow, I won’t eat you! If you’re here, the password is nyeb-nip. I’ll tell you the second password when our work’s done. Tomorrow, if I catch you, give me the passwords, and you have my word that you’ll go free!”

Aziraphale looked over the sea of rodents in great confusion, but apparently this message was intelligible to them.

“Good!” Crawly said. “Tonight we’re sabotaging that army! Look at the angel, and we’re going to demonstrate how. We’re asking you to eat _leather_ and _string_. Bow, Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale conjured a bow and held it up. Crawly pulled the string. “See this here? A few bites from one of you, and-“ The string snapped, and the bow slackened. “See?”

They held up a quiver next, demonstrating which straps to eat; then a shield, with its handle and arm-straps. Crawly sent the mice down, and asked the rats to remain behind, before assigning them the tougher leather of horse-reins and chariot ties.

“Crawly,” Aziraphale said, choked with gratitude. “I really am-“

“Don’t make me punch you again,” Crawly said, and he grinned. “You’re buying the drinks for the next century. We’ll find the finest wine in Jerusalem tomorrow, yeah?”

“Yes. Absolutely. Good luck.”

“And you, angel.” Crawly made himself invisible to human eyes, and went in the direction of the siege towers. Aziraphale shifted his tunic open and took to the air.

The piles of brushwood were being set against the walls; when the fighting began, these would be set on fire, and the heat would crack the city walls, send the soldiers atop them running from the heat. Aziraphale soaked them all, until every twig was damp and rotting. From the air he could spot the Assyrian sappers, and he spent hundreds upon hundreds of small miracles shattering every stone and metal tool. He could hear exclamations of shock as the soldiers below found the rats and mice in their gear. Aziraphale swooped down to these and sent the campfires out of control, made them scare the horses into bolting, made the fires spread and catch the tents.

It was by one of these he stopped to sit, just for a moment. His back ached; he hadn’t flown so much in one go for a long, long time. Overhead the moon told him it was past midnight; soon the blackness would turn to charcoal, then slate, then stone…

His head was pounding. There was a small movement by his foot. A field mouse looked up at him, barely visible, and placed a tiny paw on Aziraphale’s toe.

Invisible, surrounded by the shouts and the chaos, Aziraphale laughed. “Yes, I’m fine. Just tired. You’ve all done marvellous work. Thank you. Do you know where Crawly is?”

The mouse groomed its whiskers, and fled. Aziraphale took that as a negative.

The shouting and the chaos began to quieten; the running soldiers began to slow. A white light grew around him, and Aziraphale was surrounded, all at once, by the light and glory and _fury_ of angels.

Gabriel, Sandalphon, and Naqamiel, God’s Punisher. Oh, he was in _trouble._ It was all he could do not to close his wings around him to hide his face, like a human child.

“Aziraphale,” said Gabriel, alight with the Wrath of the Almighty, “I seem to have made a mistake. You see, I thought that I told you to kill every soldier in the Assyrian army. In fact, I said as much to Sandalphon here, 'Just gave Aziraphale a direct order to kill every soldier in the Assyrian army'. Did I say that, Sandalphon, or did I say something else?”

“No, you _definitely_ said that one hundred and eighty-five thousand Assyrians had to be dead by sunrise, and that you had given Aziraphale a direct order to kill them himself,” said Sandalphon. He rubbed his chin in mock thought. “Nope, no, definitely nothing else. Those exact words.”

“I thought I had. I was sure I had.” Gabriel stared down at Aziraphale. “So why do I see rats and mice eating bowstrings and reins, hmm? Why do I see you directing rain onto bushes? Puffing wind at a few campfires?”

“I…” Aziraphale said. “I, um. I thought I could make them retreat without ha- having to kill them-“

“You’re not here to think!” Gabriel suddenly roared. “You’re here to _obey_! You don’t have the _mind_ to think!”

Behind the archangels stood Naqamiel, golden and terrible. She smiled. “Why would you not want to kill them all, Aziraphale? They’re pagans. Murderers. Rapists. Torturers. They deserve it.”

“Didn’t want to get his precious hands dirty.” Sandalphon sneered. “Too good for that, aren’t you, Aziraphale? Fussy gentle little lambikins Aziraphale.”

“No! No, I- I’ve just never killed anyone-“

“Soft,” Gabriel said. “Weak. Watch a proper angel do what you couldn’t.”

“It’s my turn,” said Sandalphon, and a sword appeared in his hand.

“It’s not,” said Naqamiel. “You got Sodom and Gomorrah.”

“And I let you fulfil David’s choice,” Sandalphon replied. “You’ll get blood.”

“… all right. Sir,” she said, sketching a bow to Gabriel, and took to the skies.

Aziraphale didn’t know how to stop what was about to happen. Thousands upon thousands of men, and Crawly – where was Crawly? Would he be able to escape? If Crawly was hurt trying to help him… It didn’t bear thinking about. His stomach clenched, and he bent forward.

“Oh, no.” Gabriel fisted his hand in Aziraphale’s hair and dragged him upright.

Aziraphale’s hands fluttered helplessly at the back of his head. “Please-“

“No. We’re going to follow Sandalphon. You seem to need the education.”

Sandalphon grinned, and hefted the sword in his hand. The light around them began to fade, and the noise around them grew louder. “Watch and learn.”

Sandalphon walked ceaselessly among the army of the Assyrians for six hours, swinging his sword. He cut down men effortlessly, a hundred every minute. From his left hand a miasma spread, carrying choking, vomiting, fever, pustules and seizures, the helpless emptying of bowels in disease or death.

The smell was unbearable. The sound was worse than unbearable. And worse than the sound was the psychic press of terror as humans died in their thousands, screaming for mothers and lovers and children and homes, never to be seen again.

The hardest part for Sandalphon and Gabriel, apparently, was walking over the writhing mass of dying bodies. They were piled around them. It made Aziraphale remember the waves they had walked through, when Moses led them through the Sea of Reeds.

He tried closing his eyes. But Gabriel shook his hand, still fisted tight in the hair at the back of Aziraphale’s head, and forced him to look as Sandalphon sliced the top of a man’s head off.

“They’re surrendering-“ he tried, just once, and Gabriel shook his fist again. So they walked on, inexorable, all the way around the walls of Jerusalem.

By the time the sun rose, the air was thick with the smells of the night and the groans of the nearly dead. The Kidron Valley was clogged with bodies; cursed Gehenna was plugged. To Aziraphale, swaying with grief and exhaustion, it was as though the valleys had been filled in. Zion was no longer a mountain, but part of a plain.

On the walls above them, as the light stroked perverse fingers across the land and showed the soldiers on the battlements the thousands upon thousands of bodies, a cheer of desperate joy was spreading. 

“Right,” said Gabriel. He opened his hand, and stroked Aziraphale’s hair flat with horrible gentleness. Then he brushed his hands against each other, and tufts of Aziraphale’s hair floated away, like feathers on the wind. “Professional as always, Sandalphon. Very nicely done. As for you, Aziraphale, we’ll go Upstairs for your punishment.”

“Punishment?” said Aziraphale. He wanted to laugh. No, he wanted to weep, but he had no tears; only something like a scream, building up in him and making his hair stand on end. What remained of it. “Wasn’t- I thought _that_ was my punishment?”

Gabriel held out his hands, performatively puzzled. “Er, no? That was us making sure that _your_ job got done.”

“If I remember correctly,” Sandalphon said, showing a mouth of teeth, all ivory and gold, “the punishment for disobeying a direct order is sixty lashes of fire.”

“So it is. You must know, I’m disappointed, Aziraphale. I won’t lie and say I’m not. It’s not just a matter of the disrespect, you know? It’s hurtful. Hurtful, to know you pay my words so little attention.” Gabriel sighed heartily. “Well. Up we go.”

*

Jerusalem was alive with joy and relief, flowing with wine, brimming with song.

Aziraphale walked stiffly through the street from the Temple, where he’d been set down. He’d spent the night there, too pained to move, and started to shift at dawn. He was too recognisable. He’d have to go somewhere new, until this generation had died. _Nineveh_ , his mind supplied, and he didn’t laugh.

He placed one foot in front of another. Step. Step. The advantage of the lashes of fire was that they cauterised the wounds they inflicted. Very... efficient, really. Gabriel liked efficiency.

Wine. He wanted wine. Anything to numb the pain that still blazed across his back, that had buffeted his head. That tore at his heart. And of course, Ineffability dictated that in the first tavern he found, there was Crawly, five jugs deep.

Their eyes met.

Crawly jerked his head. “You’re paying, remember?”

Aziraphale did, somewhere. Somewhere deep down, under all the blood. But his feet were rooted to the ground. He could go in, and sit, and Crawly would pour the wine, and-

And if Heaven found out, it’d be another sixty lashes of fire. More, probably, for fraternising with the enemy.

Crawly’s face closed; his eyes suddenly made Aziraphale think of fire reflected against the bronze on the gates of Jerusalem, or the gold on the gates of the Temple which Hezekiah had stripped off in the hopes of placating Sennacherib last time. “Fine. Sod off, then. It’s not like I want to hang out with an angel today anyway.”

Aziraphale’s hands were clasped in front of him. His knees were shaking. He looked down, and was almost surprised to see the clean-swept stone, rather than bodies. They’d climbed over the bodies. He could feel Gabriel’s hand in his hair, forcing him on.

Crawly was still looking at him. “… I fucked off. As soon as I felt other angels.”

Aziraphale nodded. The entire world was red, with blood and the burning pain up his back. “Good. Good. Worried.” He swallowed painfully, and licked his lips. “Was worried.”

“For fuck’s sake, sit down,” Crawly said, and poured out another cup of wine.

Aziraphale had to press his hands to the wall and make his way down onto the cushions as slowly as he could. It was a strange point of pride, that Crawly not know about the lashes. He didn’t want Crawly to know… He was embarrassed. He was ashamed. "I shouldn't. I'm disobedient..."

Crawly sat next to him with graceful ease, and handed him the cup. “That’ll help.”

The wine was too sweet. It tasted like rot. Aziraphale drank it all in one long mouthful.

Crawly filled it again.

Aziraphale didn’t weep. All the tears had been burnt out of him.

“We tried,” Crawly said. “Sometimes that’s all you can do. There was going to be death whatever we did. At least you tried.”

Aziraphale stared at the wall. “I don’t think I can do this anymore, Crawly.”

“What choice do you have?”

There was only one that he could think of. He’d endured the holy fire; he wouldn’t need to endure the unholy. One lick of hellfire, and he’d never have to worry again.

But an angel couldn’t summon hellfire. Probably for the best.

“None, I suppose,” was all he said. “Same as you.”

“Same as me.”

Aziraphale swallowed a draught of wine, and closed his eyes. “I honestly thought we had a shot.”

“Nah. I never did,” Crawly said with a sip. “I thought it was a fool’s errand.”

Aziraphale looked at the demon in anguish. Fire prickled at the corners of his eyes. “Then why on earth did you _help_?”

Crawly quirked a lip at him. He shrugged. “I suppose I just have a weakness for fools.”

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this fic is from Lord Byron's poem _The Destruction of Sennacherib_. I don't make the rules.
> 
> I've mostly followed the version of this story set out in 2 Kings 18-19, but the detail of the mice chewing the bow-strings comes from Herodotus Book 2:141. A far cuter explanation of why Sennacherib turned back in the Levant.
> 
> The "lashes of fire" are the _pulsei denura_ , the standard punishment dolled out to angels by Heaven in the Talmud. Gabriel receives sixty lashes for not following an order as given in Yoma 77a, and the Metatron is given sixty in Hagigah 15a.


End file.
